


Polaris

by ofsevenseas



Series: Two Steps to the Left [2]
Category: A Study in Emerald - Neil Gaiman, Sherlock (TV)
Genre: AU, Body Horror, M/M, Slash, Triggers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-11-24
Updated: 2010-11-24
Packaged: 2017-10-13 08:51:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,624
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/135423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ofsevenseas/pseuds/ofsevenseas
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The stars whisper to Irene and call her sister, when all the world is going mad.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Polaris

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Русский available: [Полярная Звезда](https://archiveofourown.org/works/548750) by [Sellaginella](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sellaginella/pseuds/Sellaginella)



> Many, many, many thanks to [lunatique](http://lunatique.dreamwidth.org) and [vodkashots](http://vodkashots.dreamwidth.org), who stayed with me through the stages of me trying to brainstorm (hint: it did not go well) and beta'd it, respectively. Also, I totally cheated on the POV, so it's not supposed to be Brit-picked. Don't toss rocks! (Tomatoes will be used for guacamole.)
> 
> ETA: A lot of people don't seem to have read Neil Gaiman's _A Study in Emerald_ , to which I can only say: [GO GO GO](http://www.neilgaiman.com/mediafiles/exclusive/shortstories/emerald.pdf). It's totally worth it, and this fic will wait.
> 
> This fic has since been translated in Russian [here](http://pay.diary.ru/~sherlockbbc/p156166490.htm%20).  
> [Sellaginella](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Sellaginella/profile) has created a beautiful manip for the story [here](http://sellaginella.deviantart.com/art/Polaris-282310031).

Irene is nine years old when she looks up at the stars of her home city and hears them whisper to her, _it is time. It will be time. Be ready, sister._

There are things no one speaks of, of the Wilsons’ brilliant son, gone missing after a long day’s work at the White Palace and found in the Potomac; of the Lisbons’ Cecelia (and Lux, and Isabella, and Mary, and Therese), all flaxen hair and delightfully sensitive blushes, discovered in the garage, of the carefully blank faces on national broadcast as yet another series of puckered, dry corpses are found, and no one speaks at all.

It is a great honour, of course, to catch the eye of a Great One. They are glorious, they are immortal, they are the all-giving, all-taking sublimity of the heavens.

Her talent for music, for transmuting the call of the stars into soaring, leaping song, does not go unnoticed, and the last she sees of her mother, white-faced and smiling, is on the same night the stars lull her to sleep with their words.

Irene is not a fool. She knows for which purpose she is being groomed, knows that her lifespan can be numbered in the writhing whirls of a princeling’s eyes. The only thing keeping her alive is her extraordinary talent for surpassing herself, and so the arias, chants, hymnals and other performances keep her untouched, even as they thrill the senses of the King’s court.

The years pass, the leaves turn, and never has she forgotten the stars’ words.

\---

She keeps away from her security detail as much as possible, though she knows there are at least three people (and countless princelings) who would love to get hold of the King’s favourite songbird. Their end goals are rather different, but from what she hears of the Restorationists, the methods seem to leave the same unbreathing wrecks behind. Irene’s mind is not clean and cold and divided into convenient areas, so she would rather offend Bell and Sanchez if it means she is away from the throbbing awareness that they both sport the puckered seal of the King, and that one day she will feel those same gelatinous limbs upon her skin, crawling over her face and neck, and that it will be the last thing she knows.

The King’s staff know to give her the tallest rooms, with the largest windows, and though today’s rain slaps and hisses against the glass of her balcony doors, she can hear the hum of the stars behind the clouds, an atonal susurration of _not yet, not yet._

She takes a kind of comfort in that.

\---

Curiosity draws the Queenkin, the Imperskii, and other Princelings flocking to the court of the New King, enshrined in his white marble palace, built from the monuments of bygone times. Irene sings, and tries to remember her melodies in the face of waving tentacles, dripping maws, and the siren call of a greater, vaster power to her mind, always seeking a way in, groping in the spaces of her song to overpower her. For the first time, she truly understands why the Favoured never remain sane beyond middle age, if they are not first consumed.

At night, she breathes the rank air and tries to think of wide, open spaces and the whispers of the glittering sky with no one but humanity within range. Her concerts give the frenzied Restorationists a target, a veritable glut of death and green ochre to flaunt, and the newspapers scream of The Nameless Butcher, of Dagonsbane, and other sensational headlines littering the internet. Irene’s performances tap into that volatility, swooping up and down in eldritch harmony and holding impossibly long.

 _Good,_ the stars sing, eerily drifting across the rosy blush of a rising sun, _you do very well._

Almost as if in retaliation, her choristers begin disappearing, the youngest, handsomest ones first. She carefully conceals her trembling hands when Sanchez tells her, face blank as always, that new security measures would have to be improvised in the face of unexpected enthusiasm. The chorus boys don’t have the luxury of being the only human who can sing in tune with the stars, and her protection, a pittance at the best of times, is clearly failing.

The thing about the Great Ones: their hunger is never-ending, and the more delicate their food, the better.

She knows the King, knows in her heart that her sublimated fear and despair is only the appetizer to his long-anticipated feasting. He will wait for Irene to reach the zenith of her skill, celestial songs still echoing in her throat so he can taste them on her tongue. She knows also that it will be soon: the Great Ones are not known for their forbearance.

The consumption, she thinks with a shudder, would be as the divinest of delights to him.

\---

Archduke Wilhelm von Lothringen is only sixteenths Princeling, minor and almost ignorable in the greater hierarchy of the Queenkin and Imperskii who prey upon Europe. He has never been embroiled in any open scandals (thus avoiding the fate of Franz Drago), preferring instead to keep quietly to the borders of his small principality. Until today. Until he broke the rules of the subtle dance between those of his kind and openly took a prize meant for another's pleasure.

This is all she knows.

That he is insignificant beyond measure to compare with the King does not matter, does not register, as his many arms slither up towards her face, the buzzing of his mind wrapped around hers. _Szsing for me, little bird_. The pressure is immense, and she struggles against the sensation of flies descending and alighting on her nerves, leeching pollution into her very soul. He has not yet begun the feeding proper, and already she is exhausted from keeping him at bay.

Irene swallows convulsively around her throat, willing her pulse to slow, bearing down on the stench of hunger and the endless, aching void, and reaches out with her mind to the stars. The first notes come to her, a wavering, darting thing; it used to be a children’s song - frogs and ponds, and the sun shining on laughing cats - the archduke is swaying, eyes closed to feed off the strength and humanity of the music.

He does not notice when she reaches into her skirts for the knife she always keeps ready, and only lets out a choking gasp when she slides it into his chest. His tentacles tighten on her face, but she is already knifing him in his second heart and slitting his throat.

His manservant whirls around at the first sound he makes, even while she continues singing, low throated and triumphant. She wipes the back of her hand across her ichor-splattered face, and sings the doors closed, the wood vibrating in collusion with her voice. With a knife in hand, she advances on the tall man, binding his clothes together while humming the last aria of _Tristan und Isolde_.

To her surprise, the man joins in on the next measure, enunciating _mild und leise_ with a gratifyingly strong baritone.

“I apologize,” he continues, with an ironic look at his effectively straitjacketed body, “I had meant to dispose of him before you woke.”

It is one thing, Irene thinks numbly, to be told that Rache is a consummate actor and assassin, and another to witness him in action. He procures a set of new clothing, undoubtedly difficult onboard a closed-register vessel bound for Albion, and his friend the doctor, limp nowhere in sight, checks her over carefully for shock. He pronounces her in perfect health, with a lingering look into her eyes, and rises to clean the room.

Despite his quick, efficient and rather heartless dissection of the archduke’s corpse, the Doctor - John, he gently corrects her - is the most ordinary man she has ever met. He quietly reprimands Sherlock when the other waxes too enthusiastic about her newfound abilities to be aware of boundaries, and he is the one who offers a firm hand to Irene and leads her to a clean bedroom near the starboard bow, telling her that he and Sherlock are ‘a door away, so just try to get some rest’.

It is the best night’s sleep she has ever had since she was nine.

\---

Occasionally she finds John looking at the white streak in her hair with compassion, face crumpling up in sympathy. She tries to reassure him, tries to explain in words the teetering terror of every day she spent in the King’s entourage, surrounded by his hounds in human form. Irene is glad to be out of it, even when she is shivering in a dank warehouse on the edges of Cardiff, waiting for Sherlock to come back with word from M.

He seems to understand what she is trying to say: Irene is only twenty-two, but she can count on one finger the number of people who have been exposed to the Old Ones for 13 years and still remain sentient.

She lets his hand curl loosely around hers, taking comfort from its ordinary human warmth, and falls asleep that way.

In her dreams, the stars chime in agreement.

\---

She learns to defend herself, openly doing so instead of smiling into multicoloured eyes and demurely stepping behind her phalanx of bodyguards.

“You’ve heard of the 8-second rule, right?” John says, only marginally after landing at Liverpool and finding shelter, shedding pursuers in the night. “A woman has only 8 seconds to incapacitate any male attacker before the odds change to his favour.”

Irene nods. She had prepared for being free, alone in a world that was improbably hostile to humanity, and even if she is not alone any longer, there are still battles ahead.

Sherlock hums in assent, already sitting down on a ratty maroon sofa, and steeples his fingers, “Throw that out. I want you to forget it all. We can teach you how to see and pinpoint weaknesses, which will work on all potential opponents. Given your abilities, we may even be able to extend that advantage a little.”

Irene can’t read the quick exchange of glances they share, but John nods, “You mustn’t fight them head-on without a strategy, it's the quickest way to get killed. If you have to run, do it. Sherlock and I will take care of the rest.”

A week ago, Irene would have been offended: she has since seen their quicksilver motions and devastating talent for accuracy. Catching sleep at random intervals and running, always running, she eventually learns to balance her burgeoning gifts with John and Sherlock, keeping a step ahead and guarding their rear.

\---

The first time they are in Paris, Irene shows them how to listen to the stars. They oblige with a chorus, a story of the first star and the envy of the void, from whence the Old Ones came. Sherlock looks like he would rather scratch an unholy yowling accompaniment on the violin, but John is utterly enchanted.

 _You are Irene_ , they sing when her partners have gone to bed, _Irene for peace_.

\---

The second time they are in Paris, she adopts the name Ladybird, and stumbles on a secret that is meant to be told:

Irene comes back from trap-setting sooner than she expects, flushed with the success of using song-glamour. Three cartons of pad Thai from Rue Saint-Gilles swing from the bag on her arm, anticipatory celebration for another mark achieved. Sherlock frowns upon such gestures, considers them a frivolity and completely unnecessary for their work, but Irene fully intends to enjoy her freedom.

Her cheerful ‘bonjour’ dies in her throat when she hears a series of thumps from upstairs. Irene sets the food down carefully, nerves thrumming with John’s instructions and Sherlock’s pointers on strategy.

She gathers herself and begins a slow lament under her breath, invisibility spreading down and out, until she is a barely perceptible ripple against the yellow wallpaper. The door shuts, slowly, as if by itself.

Maintaining a screen of invisibility is difficult and taxing on her concentration, but Irene does her best to keep her movements as silent as possible. She has no time to think about what it means when the room has gone silent, no emotion to spare to the knowledge that she has been expecting this from the day she walked into the palace and heard the stars telling her to wait. Irene knows only that if there is a chance for survival, she must take it. She edges the landing door open, holding her breath and raises the handgun to the first target that presents itself. Her only fleeting thought is regret for her aim, still patchy at best.

Weeks of training and John’s iron insistence that you ‘ _never drop the gun, Irene, ever_ ’ is the only thing keeping her gun in the air, especially when the light catches on the smooth lines of Sherlock and John’s interlocking bodies. John is biting Sherlock’s ear, and thrusting slowly into him, using gravity and angles to leverage their differences in height. Sweat drips from Sherlock’s hair, wet strands trembling ever so slightly with each thrust. He groans when John, buried hilt-deep, presses a hand on his back and pushes him down towards the floor.

Recovering, Irene turns to shut the door, still hearing Sherlock scrabble at the wooden floorboards as John keeps pressing. When she stands to face them again, flushed and sucker-seared imprint showing white on her cheek, Sherlock is moaning and - Irene can find no other word for it - writhing against John.

She crosses her arms, gun safely tucked into the small of her back, as John bites Sherlock’s neck, hard, leaving livid teeth marks. Immediately Sherlock arches up and back into John, a deep groan rising from his throat as he comes. John doesn’t change the pace, even when he looks up and grins to see Irene leaning nonchalantly against the door. He finishes in a soft crescendo of gasps, circular imprints clearly visible in the hollow of Sherlock’s hip, and collapses, panting into his neck and shuddering in unison with him.

Sherlock speaks up, after they have all caught their breaths. “Enjoying the view?”

She is certain, from the smug tone Sherlock is using, that she was meant to see this, “You’ve made a mess of the floor and _I’m_ not going to clean it up.”

John stirs a little at that, and looks apologetic, still completely unaware Sherlock has effectively labelled him ‘Property of Sherlock Holmes’ in front of Irene.

Sherlock huffs impatiently, snaking an arm around John’s scarred torso, and announces, voice cool and businesslike as if he wasn’t just being fucked into the floor just moments ago, “We pack for St. Petersburg tonight.”

Irene thinks of the months she and John spent holding Sherlock together with song and thread, and of Moriarty, serving his pustulant masters to the end, and wonders if they are doomed to the tyranny of such things forever.

\---

Their project in Russia occupy them for some time: the Imperskii are numerous and the revolutionaries are proving intractable. M makes sure that the epithets Rache, the Doctor, and Ladybird are printed in bold font and spray-painted on derelict walls, whispers of Restoration growing louder each day. She knows each death is now a personal blow to the Old Ones. They are afraid.

One day, Sherlock brings home a Chinese newspaper, and gleefully translates the wholesale destruction of the Goat-Emperor’s Beijing compound. She and John share a moment of satisfaction, acknowledgement of a fellow soldier’s job well-done, and go on poring over the map of Recovered Ukraine. There is much more to be done.

Far above, the stars tinkle gently. _Have a care, sister._

**Author's Note:**

> Comments and feedback are welcome, as always. :D


End file.
